"Triggered by recent examples of bad behavior and dissatisfaction among developers and users alike, the Gentoo Council has drafted a new Code of Conduct that will be enforced for both developers and users. The draft of the Code of Conduct is currently being discussed on the Gentoo-dev mailing list."

The fact remains that Gentoo users and developers, save for anyone who has had the best sense to abandon ship, have shown a lack of maturity that is resonating through the open source channels - and I'm quite sure Redmond is watching this one closely to use in some kind of PR move in the near future despite the localization of the problem.

If it requires a code of conduct just to bring everything, and everyone, under control and to squelch the throwing of sand in the schoolyard sandbox, then it's not worth it to use.

What do I see the need for? Growing up - and that's something just about anyone can do without anything written.

Geez what a load of hysterical horse shit. Damn those gentoo using bastards, doing linux right and ruining open source for everyone. Oh stop it you kids, Redmond is watching, yeah, like somebody gives a flying f--k and that could actually matter outside of that paranoid delusion.

You put down ground rules and enforce them equally so nobody feels left out, squelched or favoritism, it's what keeps fights from breaking out in the schoolyard and yes, surprisingly in society at large. You know, those law things. It's what grown-ups do in and out of the sand box all over the entire planet.

If it requires a code of conduct just to bring everything, and everyone, under control and to squelch the throwing of sand in the schoolyard sandbox, then it's not worth it to use.

I don't agree. It's unfortunate but any time you get together so many people with differing viewpoints these things are bound to happen. This is why every school, job, and club out there has some kind of code of conduct and the ones that don't usually end up having serious personnel problems.